Thursday, May 12, 2011

Apparently it has become popular to add a little border in your shower tile. I have even seen HGTV recommending this crazy idea! Let's face it, you can't afford to buy all the nice pretty expensive tile so instead of just wishing it luck in someone else's home, you buy a tiny strip of it and tack it up around the perimeter.

This does not look good!

The first problem is that it cuts your shower in half visually and makes it look smaller.

I don't even begin to guess what these people were thinking! Not only is the tiny border terrible but what the heck is that trim tile doing on the wall? Is it supposed to be a shelf?

This is a great example of a small shower. Look how that horrible border cuts the shower in half. It would've been much better to just leave it off.

The second problem is that they are under-scaled!

Do I follow the line until I get to the prize at the end?

Beautiful shower but why did they ruin it with that ugly diagonal border? It would also look better with frameless glass but I know that stuff is pricey!

Again, another luxury shower ruined by badly placed border.

So what do you think? Am I just crazy to let this bother me or are you on my side? Well, let me show you some showers that got it right and you tell me which looks better, border or no border.

When in doubt, stick with white! Let the walls be the color in the room. Paint is much cheaper than tile!

This is interesting. I think it works to put the mosaic there because it doesn't break up the shower, however once you have your stuff up there you are probably not going to want to draw attention to your shampoo bottles!

Very nice! But I could live without the white trim piece in the shower. I can see why they did it though because the tile is continuous from wainscot to shower. It would've looked better to leave that piece out of the shower and just stopped it where it intersects with the vertical piece. It is really under-scaled to be in the shower. Also, you can see that they had to cut the tile at the top of the shower. If they would've left off the trim piece they would've had more room for a full tile at the top.

This is a great example of a tile trim piece being the correct scale. It is used to separate a wainscot with the rest of the shower and it works because it is the same tile, just installed differently. This keeps the color constant in the shower and doesn't really break it up visually. Adds interest without making the shower look smaller.

Here is a good example of using accent tile in the correct way. A detailed medallion looks great instead of just running a border around the perimeter.

You could just always do the whole shower in mosaic! What do you think? Too much? If you do have a mosaic shower, make sure and keep the rest of the room very simple.

Love this!

This is a great kid's bathroom!!!

Very pretty marble tile but what do you think about that border running over the shower curb?

This is gorgeous! A great example of using mosaic tile on one wall in shower and then keeping the other walls neutral. I also love how they put the mosaic on the exterior of the shower curb and half wall.

Wow, life's a beach in this bathroom! It makes me a little dizzy. The tile is definitely cool but everything else is just off the mark. The rugs, the towel bar interrupting the tile wall and the vanity mirror.

So am I just too opinionated or do you agree that shower borders are horrible? Let me know what you think, we love getting comments!

I'm a latecomer here, and stumbled upon your blog. I've been trying to select tile for a shower, and have chosen a beautiful quartzite. My contractor took me to some other jobs he had done, but I felt that adding another tile (white subway tile above the same quartzite we selected) or borders/medallions just took away from the beautiful natural stone showers. So I think you are right, 100%, but there are lots of others who are disagree!

Finally someone who agrees! I sometimes equate it to a decorative toilet seat- Why??!! in the world would you want to attract attention to a toilet seat! And it cuts the room in 1/2 making the ceiling seem lower!

I don't like the border in the middle--as stated, it cuts the room in half. However, if you have a high ceiling, a carefully chose border adds visual interest an a little bling to an otherwise boring, cavernous space. Something not too high contrast and in scale with the other tiles.

You made me laugh!! I'm with you all the way! I'm designing our shower now and have noticed that the borders make me tilt my head, scratch,open and close my eyes. Shake my head and wonder what the accent lines are doing?!? Odd. Just odd. Glad you are so opinionated! Thanks for the laugh!

I agree that those borders all look horrible, but I think most of the "all mosaic" showers. Most mosaics I've seen sold are really poorly done - horrible color selections with way too much contrast for widespread use. The showers that were all mosaic just looked completely garrish and distasteful to me, and the high contrast in many of them made it look like the shower was warp-driving through a star field; incredibly way too busy. I would say that any widespread use of 1x1 tiles should be solid color, or a mosaic of very subtle variation so as to add texture and warmth, but not distract the eye.

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Had to laugh. I just redid our downstairs bathroom in tile and put in the tile border you hate. I love it. The line draws the eye around the space, it runs across the top of the tile wainscot on the back wall and through the floor to ceiling tile in the shower tying them together. The proportions are good and I think it makes the space look less sterile (from another comment) and less blocky and composed of adjacent rectangles of tile. I was amused to see that one example you called "gorgeous! A great example of using mosaic tile on one wall in shower and then keeping the other walls neutral" has a thin border of the mosaic running through the neutral walls and I think those lines are what saves it from being too blocky. The line running from the shower across the floor is also one of the highlights of that bathroom. In answer to "what they were thinking", they clearly have a different aesthetic than you do and it just that: different. It's certainly not less valid or worse.

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it seems you hate ALL accent strips. I disagree. They shouldn't be in the middle of the shower (cut it in half like you said) or run all over the place as some of your examples do. But the right classy border up higher on the wall and on the simple side (about 6 tiles wide) can be a very nice focal point. Depends on what else is going on in the room.

As I said to my sister, "We are different". That doesn't mean some of us are wrong and some of us are right. It just means it's OK to like different things. I personally think the tile borders are fabulous.

I have to say that I am so tired of subway tile. And in a bathroom with all walls and shower tiled, my immediate gut reaction was institution. It reminded me of the old hospitals I did my internships in. Sterile!

It's just you....decorative tile trim in showers is just more interesting. I redid my bathroom with a walk in shower with a single border of 4" decorative hand painted Mexican Talavera tile. It turned out gorgeous with the terracotta tile used in the rest of shower and floor. It takes me on vacation every single morning.

If you like a border, then add one. If you don't... If adding a border, my advice is to keep it simple, don't over do it. Always keep in mind the resale .... even if you plan on dying in this home, someday it will have to be sold... even if it's by the surviving family members... Keep the tile relatively neutral, not too overly trendy, and release your personality with the paint and fixtures - the not so permanent things. Personally - a simple border can tie a shower to the rest of the bathroom, the bedroom, and possibly the rest of the house if used in other places. When a border is placed higher on the wall in a small bathroom, it will bring your eyes up - helps you to see the vertical space as well - you won't just see the small footprint. Just my opinion though.

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I was beginning to think I was the crazy one for not liking it. But yes, I shudder every time I see some stupid strip of mosaic tile just there. like , oh everyone is doing this, it must be pretty! But no, it just ruins the tile that was there. Like, why in a subway tiled shower do people think that running a line of mosaic will make it look good? No only does it not look good, but it takes away from the classic and clean and non fussy look of subway tile! Thank you, thank you for voicing this! Please people stop doing it!

I AGREE!!! I absolutely hate the stripe in the shower stalls! It's a trend that is long-overdue to die. We're putting in two showers at the new house and NEITHER of them are getting a stripe. Pure, clean, large marble tile on both, zero embellishments, borders, bottle niches, nothing! Cleaner and less grout lines to clean up later and whatever you stick in that stripe today may not be so popular in 20 years. I can't wait to see how many people have to rip out their shower tile jobs when this trend becomes horribly unpopular. Believe me, it will. Remember mirrored walls of the 70s? Anyone like those now? Nope! How about shag carpet? How "red kitchens". Sorry, trends are to risky in a long-term installation like tile.

I really think the application has to look right, and if it does, go for an in-scale, appropriate border.

There is also a practical consideration - our tiler got us to go and buy a border because we have a window in our shower and would have had to have a strip of small, cut tile under it, which would have looked worse.

While I'm not a huge fan of borders, it was needed for aesthetics in this case.

Wow, someone sure thinks highly of their own opinion. My opinion is half of the things you pointed out I agreed with, sometimes I think you just rubbed it in that some people might have a small budget and I guess you don't so that makes you feel mighty? Perhaps you should remember everyone is different and we each have our own style, makes the world much more interesting.

I have a vertical mosaic "feature strip" on my bathroom and toilet wall, which I hate! I would love to remove them and do something better without having to tile the whole area. The other tiles are very large so it would look silly to try to cut up a large tile and fit it in hoping that you can't tell. Got any ideas?

I agree with you on scale, but my rental just flooded in Harvey and in putting it back together I did travertine with a single chevron as a border at eye level in the shower/tub combo. The scale of it and fact that it’s high up make it look fine since it’s not half way up. In the master where there’s a garden tub next to a stand up shower, we did a honeycomb shower pan that matched the materials in the chevron (a mosaic in both) and used the travertine 8x12, but only did the border in the shower. Plain and simple in the garden tub.

So I agree with your logic, but if you take what you’re saying into consideration when selecting a border, and you remember that sometimes less is more, you can make it work.

The showers aren’t done but the kitchen is and I can attach a pic to get your take if I could figure out how lol.

Although a couple of the bad examples really are bad, most are not that bad and some actually look great. Those thin borders go a long way to break up an otherwise monotonous looking tiled shower. In addition to that, they can perform double duty with tying together the overall color scheme of the shower area. It's just like tying a shiny ribbon around a gift box. . .

I too am about to renovate a smallish bathroom. The trend for white walls, charcoal grey floors and a neutral palette for an accent strip in showers has left me cold. So I have decided that while I will have the large 60x30 glossy wall tiles and maybe the charcoal floor but I will be having feature wall in the shower using some beautiful mosaic tiles in all colours of the sea. I think it will look lovely and will make me feel as though I am swimming in a pool or the ocean. Bring back some COLOUR I say.

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